


Fond, But Not in Love

by SBG



Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Angst, Happy Ending, M/M, Misunderstandings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-31
Updated: 2014-07-31
Packaged: 2018-02-10 16:36:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 18,302
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2032107
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SBG/pseuds/SBG
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve faces the facts, except the facts aren't what they immediately seem and things get painfully confusing for him. Then there's a sniper and Danny catches on. The situation improves drastically.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [H50 Reversebang](http://h50-reversebang.livejournal.com/) over on El Jay, inspired in part (it spawned a scene, which I wrapped in a wee bit of navel-gazing and angst) by this fabulous artwork by [annieke](http://archiveofourown.org/users/annieke):  
> [](http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/annieke/12885351/3635/3635_original.jpg) 
> 
> Here's a [link](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2049141), so you can give her a kudos for the great work!
> 
> This is set in late season two, please keep that in mind. Many thanks to [LdyAnne](http://archiveofourown.org/users/LdyAnne) for making sure I stayed mostly in check with this little story.

“Don’t be an animal, McGarrett,” Danny said.

Steve fought hard to keep from pointing out that it was Danny who had so far today displayed animalistic behavior, not him. Danny seemed particularly cantankerous this morning, acting like a crotchety old goat from the minute he’d pulled into Steve’s driveway to pick him up. The truck was being serviced, and Steve could only curse the timing of this now-rare carpool with his partner. The nonstop goatish bleating was precisely why Steve had made a sudden executive decision to pull the car into the first coffee stand he saw. Danny had gotten five minutes into his rant about the upstairs neighbor repeatedly dropping the soap in the shower and how the clattering noise woke Danny up just after he’d finally gotten to sleep and damn that fucker for working the swing shift, anyway, when Steve knew drastic measures had to be taken, for the good of the islands. Coffee was essential here, and not just for Danny. He was selfish. He wanted to survive the day with his head still attached to his shoulders.

“I’m not being an animal at all, Daniel,” Steve said, all innocence and light, knowing all the while it would only add fuel to the fire. It was like he couldn’t resist sometimes. “You toss that word around so much I’m not sure you remember what it means. By the way, I think sometimes you make up your own definitions for words.”

It wasn’t that Steve didn’t sympathize with Danny. Though he was trained to endure long hours and days without much rest, he could admit sleep deprivation was never exactly fun, whether the reason was an intense, classified mission or paper-thin ceilings with a clumsy asshole on the other side of them. He felt bad for the guy, truly, but like so many of Danny’s personality quirks, Steve found the crankiness as painful as it was amusing.

“Okay, fine. You’re not an animal, but you are a penny pincher, my friend, and it can sometimes be embarrassing.”

Now, in a twist that shouldn’t have come as a twist to him at all, it turned out Steve couldn’t even do something as basic as buy a cup for the guy the right way. It was going to be a long, long day if the caffeine didn’t do the trick and correct what so obviously had gone wrong overnight. With Danny, the root cause for a grump day could be anything from fighting with Rachel to stubbing a toe to being addressed solely in Pidgin (which was a trick he’d been wanting to try on Danny for ages, himself). Steve prayed to the mighty Kona bean that no matter what it was making his partner so growly, and he didn’t think it was actually the neighbor with slippery fingers, that its course was short and relatively painless.

“Drink your coffee, Danny,” Steve said. He rolled his eyes at the barista, then closed them briefly. “Please, please drink your coffee.”

“I’m just saying, it’s rude to only tip your change.” Danny gesticulated in grand form, as he often did in a good mood or bad or anything in between. “It should not have to take me so long to make this point, because I am in the right here.”

The barista cringed and tried to melt into the background. Steve offered her a reassuring smile that only made her blush and instantly look more uncomfortable. The situation was already too far gone.

“I’m sure she’d agree.” Sometimes Danny was like one of those perpetual motion machines; get him started, he’d go on forever. Perpetual talking machine. “Hours of slaving over hot espresso machines, dealing with idiot customers, the backaches, the headaches. I think these people deserve a good tip, is all.”

“It’s your drink. If it bothers you so much that I left fifty-five cents – which is a very generous tip for a plain cup of black coffee if you employ basic mathematics – why don’t you just leave one yourself?”

“Animal,” Danny grumbled again as he dropped a dollar in the tip jar before he finally picked up the most enormous paper cup of coffee the world had ever seen.

“Hey, big spender,” Steve said with a lilt in his voice and a smile.

Fortunately, they must have hit the stand at a slow moment. There was no one else in line to irritate with the unnecessary argument and their usual (not terribly witty today) repartee. As it was, the three baristas stared back and forth between Steve and Danny like they were both sprouting horns. The two in the background made strange little meep noises and then busily stared at the floor, menu and maybe one of them checked out Danny’s ass as his partner leaned for the sugar and a swizzle stick. Steve checked out the ass himself, purely reflex and not habit, before he frowned at the peeping barista and crossed his arms. Her ass-admiring ceased and desisted. His own attention might have lingered, except…

“My husband is cranky before his first cup of the day, too,” the girl (how was she old enough to be married?) confided to Steve out of the side of her mouth and behind a hand, as if that would prevent everyone in the shop but him from hearing her.

“Oh, we’re not, uh,” Steve said, waggling his right hand between him and Danny, but the girl kept verbally barreling forward.

“If the caffeine doesn’t work, I’d recommend sex. Lots and lots of sex. Makes ‘em forget everything. Men, huh?” She winked at Steve, like they were still having some kind of private moment.

Danny, having just taken his first sip of his (hopefully) mood stabilizing brew, promptly spit it out just like it happened in cartoons, classic spit-take. 

The barista startled a bit and suddenly looked horrified. “Oh, I didn’t think. I didn’t mean … you’re not the wi … there isn’t a … you’re a guy, you know … you know, actually, I’m going to stop talking since I don’t even know why I … yeah, er.”

Surprisingly, though, Danny said nothing. Not a peep while the girl dug her hole deeper and deeper. He did give a long-suffering sigh when she was all done, made a show of grabbing napkins and wiping the expectorated coffee from the counter and then stalked to the car. All wordless. It wasn’t a tantrum. It wasn’t the silent treatment. It was something, though. 

There, Steve thought, went any chance this day would improve. He shrugged at the barista and smiled, ignored the faint blush spreading across her cheekbones this time. He supposed that was better than the nauseated look she’d had moments ago. As long as he didn’t think about how she was probably imagining him and Danny going at it naked … except it wasn’t like he could corner the market on that just because he wanted to. He shook his head of that inappropriate thought, trotted out to the car. 

He stopped in front of the hood, frowned and then slipped behind the wheel. Usually on cranky days, Danny insisted on driving. Usually on cranky days, Steve let him. It was that, or risk hours of worse-than-usual pissing and moaning and the subsequent headache. He’d been surprised when Danny had let him drive from the house, now he was a tad unnerved by it given the increase in tension. This change in behavior set him on edge. It was too similar to the way Danny was when he was truly, legitimately upset. There didn’t seem to be an obvious reason for the level of discontent Danny was subtly exhibiting, and that made it all the worse.

The silence coming from the passenger seat was far more upsetting than Danny on the rantiest of days. Danny was all bark when he ranted; it was when he was quiet that he was working up to a truly menacing bite, like how he’d been when Steve had not instantly believed him about Meka Hanamoa, a mistake he wasn’t eager to repeat. Steve shot multiple glances Danny’s way as he navigated them to HQ, almost started talking a few times but could never quite figure out what he could say because he had no idea what was wrong with Danny and any little thing he said could end up causing an explosion. Which would be better. Right? He didn’t know anymore, embarrassed to admit to himself that he was thrown by Danny’s quietness this time. He needed to understand the root cause, maybe.

“Danny,” was all he managed, and it was only as he parked the car.

“No. No, nothing’s wrong. No, I’m not mad. I just didn’t expect the sex advice coming from behind the counter of a coffee stand at eight in the morning and from someone that looked about four seconds older than my daughter, no less,” Danny said flatly, unbuckling with one hand while the other clutched at his coffee. “Thank you for the caffeine, I didn’t sleep well last night and it’s helping. Okay? That’s all this is.”

Then Danny slipped out of the car and trudged up the sidewalk and into the building. Steve had the distinct impression Danny hadn’t meant over half of what he’d just said. The thing about the barista sex guidance, Danny had meant that and, wow, he was right there with him on that. Everything else, nope, not a sincere word detected. The caffeine wasn’t helping (yet). Something was wrong and someone was definitely upset. Steve narrowed his eyes, furrowed his eyebrows for a second and then decided that if he was going to figure out what was up with Danny, he wasn’t going to do it sitting in the car. 

As Steve crossed the threshold into their offices, both Chin and Kono stood at the tech table. Chin favored him with a silent raised-eyebrow face while Kono looked like she couldn’t decide if she was worried or amused. They were not uncommon expressions for either of them. Steve shook his head, rubbed the back of his neck and shrugged. Sometimes, shrugging was all that could be done when it came to Danny; everyone who knew their changeable friend also knew that.

“It’s all right,” Steve said. He waved his hand toward Danny’s office. “Once he’s checked his emails and finished his coffee, he should be closer to human again.”

“Should? Going to be a long day?” Chin asked.

“I dunno, maybe,” Steve said. He ran a hand through his hair. “You know you, ah, can’t really predict with Danny. Maybe we’ll get a case. That’ll help.”

They were on a lull with cases at the moment. It was a rare enough occurrence for them to savor for a little while, but none of them were inclined to thumb-twiddle until another hot case came in. Steve used some of that time to continue mentally worrying at Wo Fat and Shelburne and Joe White, trying to make concrete something that wanted to remain nebulous. He knew Chin and Kono liked to help out HPD when they could. Danny too, though he seemed the most inclined to sit back and enjoy the downtime out of any of them. Steve smiled a little at the thought as he moved to his office. If anyone deserved to take a break now and again, it was his partner. 

He sneaked another look at Danny, and the smile faded. It wasn’t that Danny still appeared grouchy; it hadn’t been that since the coffee stand. It was that tired expression, the resigned look on Danny’s face that Steve didn’t know what to do with. He thought if he could figure out what had put it there, maybe then he’d be able to help.

He took one step toward Danny’s office, caught his partner catching him at it and veered toward his own office instead. Maybe he’d just wait a few more minutes. Danny didn’t look like he wanted company. Steve wandered to his desk and picked up the Wo Fat file where he’d left off. Honestly, he felt like he was spinning in circles a bit, a hamster on a wheel, and it ate at him that his old buddy Joe was part of whatever machine was out there keeping Steve from the truth. He was mentally and physically exhausted by it, but he could not quit until it was all done, over, and he could move on with his life. He chewed on his lower lip for a minute, tossed Wo Fat aside and peered across the open space between his and Danny’s offices. 

When Five-0 had first formed, Steve had assumed it was an assignment with an obvious end date. That was why he hadn’t had a problem taking the job. The islands were a finite space with a finite number of criminals to put away, and aside from that he hadn’t intended on sticking around if he hadn’t found Hesse on the islands. 

It hadn’t taken him long to realize both of those thoughts were shortsighted. Civilian law enforcement and SEAL life weren’t so different, at least in that new threats always, always cropped up to replace those culled. And it turned out Steve really _enjoyed_ leading the task force; it was a distraction he’d needed so very much. It had its drawbacks, corrupt high ranking government officials and whatnot, but it also had Chin and Kono and, of course, Danny. The pros outweighed the cons. He felt like for the first time in nearly twenty years, he had a family. He’d be an idiot to walk away from them, though the ghosts of his first family continued to haunt him, pull at his brain. If it hadn’t anyway, having Wo Fat after him in a very personal way would have changed that.

Steve considered Danny family most of all and he wasn’t ashamed to admit it. Danny was Scarecrow to his Dorothy (and he would never make that comparison out loud if he wanted to avoid relentless heckling). Somehow or another, the guy Steve had initially seen as a means to an end had become one of the most trusted people in his little circle. Because of that, and other reasons he could not give voice to yet, he wanted to never see Danny unhappy, no matter what the cause. It also made him want to fix it when his partner managed to get unhappy on his own time.

He was halfway to his door without even thinking about it. Before he reached it, though, his cell vibrated in his pocket. Great, a case right now would only help yank Danny out of his funk. Steve fumbled for his phone, belatedly realizing that the vibration was text, not call. The governor wasn’t a texting kind of guy. 

_Stop staring. Goof. And stay in ur own office._

He shook his head, looked pointedly over at Danny. Danny flipped him off, then stood, walked to his windows and shut every blind. Steve couldn’t help but give a short snuff of laughter at that. It was two minutes after that when his phone went off again and he realized he had a kink in his neck from the awkward angle he’d been tilting his head to see Danny’s office, closed blinds and all. He blinked and checked the message. 

_Srsly. Dont u have someting to blow._

Really that one was too easy. In his mind’s eye, he saw Danny’s consternation and gave it a second, biting back the urge to jot off an (in)appropriate response. He knew another message would come in and it did, quickly.

 _Up. Blow up!_ A fraction of a second, then, _Supid thunbs_

 _Sure, it’s the thumbs, D_ , Steve typed quickly.

_Shut ur face_

Steve couldn’t resist the _< 3_ he sent back, or refrain from smiling when he heard Danny grousing every nasty epithet in his large repertoire for Steve from all the way across the expansive office space. Steve returned to his desk, certain now that Danny really was going to be okay, his attitude returned to normal setting. He shouldn’t be any longer, but it still surprised him that his own mood hinged on Danny’s. 

It was probably a sign of weakness. If he were still active duty, he’d never allow himself to become so attached to the people around him. Being dependent and trusting others to have his back were things easily separated from genuine and deep emotional connections most of the time. He just couldn’t find it in himself to be bothered by that change in himself. A twinge of guilt hit him when he turned his brain toward Wo Fat; he trusted his friends, his _ohana_ , implicitly, but he did not want them involved in his hunt. Not if it meant they could be caught in the crossfire. They were too important. He couldn’t risk them.

His email pinged. He peered at the screen and smiled. Danny was definitely feeling more like himself again if he was bombarding Steve with multiple technologies. Steve opened the message, ignored the fifty unopened ones below it.

 _Bored. Might orchestrate a bank heist just to give us something to do. You in?_ Then, below, _Dear IA, this is a joke, so don’t get any ideas, you enormous sacks of excrement._

Steve laughed, and a vast fondness for his friend filled him. Oh, he was more in than Danny could probably fathom, because even if the idea was given in jest, Steve would probably do it in a heartbeat if Danny actually needed him to. 

_I know some guys. Milk run. (Which is true, I do know some guys, but this is just a lighthearted response to Detective Williams’s joke and can really be ignored.)_ Steve typed and hit send. 

He grinned like a loon when he heard Danny burst into laughter a few seconds later.

H50H50H50

The day was too perfect and it put him on edge. Perfection was so often an illusion, and he was so often right to be wary when something looked one hundred percent optimal. Steve had good instincts naturally, and they had been refined with years of training.

The humidity wasn’t off the charts, the sun was bright but not overwhelmingly hot and there was a slight breeze. All of that meant the market was filled to the brim with people, a buzz of conversations filling the space just as much as the physical bodies. It wasn’t the ideal place for this, but this was the first clear opportunity they’d had to set it up. Their guy had learned a thing or two on what not to do to get caught from what happened to his predecessor, had no set base of operations that they could pin down, though they’d found several already vacated. Out wide in the open like this was a gamble. Kamekona was the perfect lure, though it had taken a _lot_ of convincing and no small amount of incentive for him to play along with Five-0 on this one. If it didn’t go to plan, Steve didn’t know if they would ever get another chance at taking this lousy son of a bitch down.

He eyed the crowd with a trained eye, spotting the mainlander who’d arrived yesterday and ended up fried to a crisp, the one that had been around for a few days to allow the reddened skin to tone into a pinkish gold. Steve scowled at the number of children and at how lax vacationers were at keeping the family close. He scowled harder at the way their man scoped out the mass of people in much the same way, except with undoubtedly more sinister intent. 

Steve wouldn’t be the first to admit it out loud for fear of the backlash from a particular partner of his, but he had control issues. Like most things in life, there were degrees to those issues. While he could let Danny drive sometimes and not be too itchy, if there was even a hint that things could go from Sunday driving to a high-speed chase, he had to be the one behind the wheel. It wasn’t his fault that their line of work made the likelihood of high-speed chases so great that, really, it was best for him to drive all the time. And contrary to Danny’s popular belief, every slight rule-bending interrogation tactic he had ever employed was completely within his power at all times. He knew his limitations.

Few knew how controlled he actually was, and Steve worked hard at maintaining certain outward appearances. For example, his feelings had to be monitored closely; in his life, he’d learned emotions were some of the deadliest weapons. He might be the only one destroyed by them, but there was almost always varying degrees of collateral damage. His controls in that regard had already been in place when he got into the Academy. The Navy simply made them more rigorous for, until very recently, obvious reasons. Even with the repeal of certain laws, the military wasn’t going to ever be a hotbed of open emotions.

Unlike everything else, though, his feelings were one area that he didn’t mask by appearing _out_ of control. It was more than a matter of conduct unbecoming, but then he took great strides to make sure the more private parts of his private life never made it beyond closed doors, no matter what those aspects of his life were. And even the tactic of keeping doors locked firmly was relaxing during his time with the rest of Five-0, as he was sometimes embarrassingly aware his emotions bled out of him for all to see and interpret however they wanted. The longer he was home, the longer he was surrounded by his friends, his _ohana_ , the more stuff he’d kept internalized for so long surfaced. 

It sometimes disconcerted him that the opening of closed emotional doors hadn’t done him or anyone else harm as he was used to expecting. He couldn’t trust it would last.

“Shit,” Kono whispered, but her voice seemed loud over the comm.

“I think we’re made,” Chin muttered. “He’s gonna…”

The point was this: when his carefully constructed controls cracked and crumbled around him, especially in certain scenarios, it tended to piss him off. Steve had a feeling he was about to get very pissed. He’d seen it coming from a good twenty yards away, before Chin or Kono had uttered a word, and couldn’t do anything except mentally will the perp to stay on his course to the left, not veer right. Naturally, the perp chose right, which was directly into the throng of people in the marketplace. Of course he went right; it was the universe’s way of laughing at Steve’s need for control. Chin and Kono were tucked away to the left and Steve spared a fraction of a second’s worth of annoyance at whichever of them had been spotted, then tossed that aside as irrelevant. 

“Damn it,” Steve said. “Danny, he’s headed your way.”

“Yeah,” Danny said. “Got ‘im.”

“Chin, Kono, you two stay put unless he bolts. He probably suspects you’re not alone, but we don’t want to spook him in this crowd, not with his history.”

Lester Calhoun was a nasty piece of work. Steve wouldn’t say he was the worst he’d ever seen, but an asshole that would sell whatever he got his hands on – guns and drugs were one thing. Their pal Kamekona wasn’t exactly pure as the driven snow in either of those markets, and more, but Calhoun had seen an opening after Sang Min’s incarceration and eventual departure from the Hawai’ian crime scene and now dealt in the human trade almost exclusively. Worse, he had no problem disposing of _merchandise_ if it wasn’t up to his impeccable standards. 

Steve knew it just like he’d known someone got made – there was no way to avoid a foot chase now. Five-0 were all in full gear and the op had been dependent on the guy walking where they wanted him to, so they could box him in with no chance for escalation. They might still box him in, but it was going to involve … and there Calhoun went.

“He’s running,” Steve said as he broke from his position. The screams of bystanders started before he’d finished stating the obvious. He lost visual in the crowd, which had gone from bustling to near stampede in the blink of an eye. “I lost him.”

“I’ve still got him,” Danny said. “He’s definitely armed and headed … oh, that motherfucker. Move, move, get out of the way!”

Steve’s heart started racing at Danny’s tone and the implication in the words. He made a beeline toward the loudest of the shouts, where people’s exodus from the market was the most chaotic. It was tough going, as he had to take care not to barrel over people who weren’t moving fast enough. That was always a big challenge, and exactly what he’d wanted to avoid. Perps didn’t give a flying fuck who they ran over, but keeping damage to a minimum was a requirement for the law and contrary to his rep for blowing stuff up, he really did always bear that in mind. Amid the rush of people heading every direction, he still couldn’t get a line on Calhoun. 

He saw Danny clear as anything, though, short and powerful with his hair bright in the sunshine. Out of the corner of his eyes, he also caught Chin and Kono skirting the edge of the market and he mentally applauded them for adapting the box trap to new circumstances, as if they’d do anything less. Steve knew they’d get the job done, so he refocused his attention on Danny. He followed his partner’s unwavering line of pursuit and finally reset his sights on Calhoun, understood immediately Danny’s cursing. 

Calhoun had gotten his hands on a small girl and was dragging her by her left wrist and her ponytail. The girl looked too scared to fight much, but was digging her heels in when she could. Good girl. Her instinct of self-preservation was keeping Calhoun from using her has a shield so far. All they needed was a few minutes. They wanted him alive, but, well, things happened sometimes to prevent that and if any of them could get a good angle, they would not hesitate. When Calhoun snapped the little girl back by her hair so sharply it almost looked like he’d broken her neck, it was the perfect opportunity.

Until a blond head got in the way, the swirl at the nape of its neck a dead giveaway as to its owner. Steve cursed, knowing too well that Danny had to know where each of his team was and that his partner had purposely obstructed his shot. His frustration didn’t last. Danny wasn’t the kind of guy to throw himself into harm’s way. No, there had to be a reason Steve couldn’t see from his vantage point. He scouted the thinned crowd and saw Chin and Kono holding position. They were exactly where he expected, but there was more. Just as he knew where they’d be, he knew how to read them and as he watched their faces go from intense focus to concern he understood what had happened. He jerked his attention back to Danny and Calhoun.

In the span of a few seconds, somehow the little girl was running with tears tracking down her face and it was Danny that Calhoun had his arm wrapped around. Half a second after taking in the new situation, Steve noticed the blade glinting in the sunlight. Damn it. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Chin and two other adults racing toward the girl – her parents, most likely, he’d been too focused on Danny before to notice they hadn’t fled like the rest of the people in the immediate vicinity. He was still focused on Danny, his every move and expression told him almost as much as words would. The switchblade Calhoun had jabbed against Danny’s right kidney filled in any blanks.

“Danny,” Steve said, the words as automatic as his steps forward. “Danny.”

In theory, a hostage was a hostage was a hostage. The truth was, though, when the person in a dangerous situation was someone close, it was different. Not so different that Steve didn’t know how to shove that twinge in his gut into a tiny box and carry on, but different nonetheless. And somehow when it was Danny that difference was more challenging to work past. Partnership forged a strong connection; it was only natural he was just that tiny bit more concerned. Steve shot a glance at Chin ushering the girl and her family to a safe distance, felt guilty for even the smallest preference to his partner’s life over hers.

“No one comes at me or this one dies,” Calhoun said, as if he held all of the cards. “I got no problem sticking a cop.”

Instantly, Steve pictured Danny on the ground, bleeding out. No. Nope, that was not happening. He gripped his weapon tightly, didn’t let his aim waver. He locked eyes with Danny for a fraction of a second, saw there an angry message: do not shoot to kill. For Danny, there was no real justice in a quick death for a piece of shit like Calhoun. Steve didn’t disagree, but he had a bullet that would look right at home in Calhoun’s forehead if that blade broke even a millimeter of skin. He glanced at Danny, while he never let his attention fully off of that knife.

“You call me a reckless danger magnet, Danny?” Steve said, ignoring Calhoun and his threat entirely. “You’ve got a daughter to think about and yet who is it jumping right into harm’s way this time? Not me.”

“I’m not the only one with a daughter.” Danny tilted his chin the direction the girl and her parents had gone to safety. “Get off my back.”

“I’m not sure it’s the right time to point out that you’ve got quite a double standard going, but what the hell. If I don’t do it now, I might not have the chance. You’re literally a captive audience.”

As they exchanged their familiar banter, Steve inched closer without being obvious about it. While his attention seemed squarely on Danny, he had Calhoun very much in his sights. He had half an eye on Kono as well, knew she was going for a vantage point where she could take out Calhoun without hitting Danny. He could do that himself, but with Calhoun focused on him it would be trickier and, frankly, he didn’t want to risk it if he didn’t have to. 

“That’s the best you can come up with?” Danny asked. He squirmed as the blade against his back dug in deeper. “Captive audience, Captain Obvious?”

“Commander.”

“Right, how dare I forget that?” 

Before Danny could continue on a new tangent, Calhoun pulled him back by his throat and all that came out of his mouth was a strangled choke. 

“Hey. Stop. Stop right there,” Calhoun said. “You think I don’t see you?”

“Don’t see me what? I’m not going to do anything to jeopardize my partner’s life,” Steve said calmly. He didn’t relax his aim, but for now he also didn’t move another inch.

“Right. You trying to distract me with your cute little lover’s spat, it ain’t gonna work. You and damsel wifey here, you both stop talking.”

Words weren’t necessary, as it turned out. Before Steve could come up with a retort to the same old, same old, Danny _moved_. He found himself rooted to the spot as Danny employed techniques he’d had zero idea his partner knew, part urban street fighting, part martial arts. He hadn’t mentally tabulated all of the plans. They had been on Plan B, but there might have been a C, D and E needed in the near future. If anything, Kono shooting the fucker was C, so this was … mesmerizing. 

Danny twisted from Calhoun and the knife like neither were a viable threat. He pivoted with more quickness than Steve would have thought him capable, hands and arms moving just as fast as he ducked and spun. Calhoun stumbled, ill prepared for Danny’s assault. Danny used that to his advantage, hands deftly striking quick jabs as he swung one leg out and caught Calhoun behind his knee. 

It was beautiful to witness and, somewhat dazed, Steve wondered how he had missed in Danny’s file that he had that kind of training. There wasn’t a whole lot of time to process much of anything else, between the first move Danny made and the last, which was to plant Calhoun face down, wrench his left arm up with one hand and effortlessly grab the zip ties at the side of his vest with the other. Steve glanced at Kono, not surprised to see her standing there with her mouth slightly ajar and eyes wide. He figured he probably had almost the same impressed guppy expression on his face. 

“I strongly encourage you to practice your right to remain silent,” Danny said, then straightened. He glared at Calhoun first, then Steve and Kono, which made it a tad difficult to know if he was only talking to Calhoun. “I mean it. Not a word.”

Danny yanked Calhoun to his knees, as if the guy didn’t outweigh him by a good fifty pounds. He beckoned Kono to come take over. When she did, he smoothed back all the hairs that had strayed out of formation and stiffly walked away.

Steve stared after him, completely at a loss for words and with complete affection for the guy who’d reduced him to such a state.

H50H50H50

If wrapping a case gave him a big high, the paperwork involved to finish it all the right way (as Danny liked to say) was a giant wet blanket. The thought of forms and reports alone was enough to sometimes take the edge off of the satisfaction at putting another shitbag behind bars for a very, very long time. Facing the inevitability of it never got easier, not even two years into his more cop-like existence. Steve liked to get it done, and move on to the next thing; it was a philosophy that had gotten him pretty far in his life.

“I’m just saying,” Steve said, spreading his arms wide in a deliberate mimic of one of Danny’s favorite postures as they walked through the main HQ doors, “that this can all wait until tomorrow. Let’s go out, have a few. You know, celebrate a job well done.”

He almost couldn’t keep the grin off of his face as Danny gave him the stinkiest of eyes, appearing unamused by both Steve’s stance and the suggestion. Sometimes Steve really did enjoy winding Danny up for the sake of it, but now he mostly really did just want a few cold beers, followed by a quick shower and then five hours of uninterrupted sleep. He was learning to appreciate life’s simple pleasures, what could he say. Paperwork was nowhere near a pleasure. Nope. The apoplectic look on Danny’s face, however…

“You’re joking, right?” Danny asked. “After all this time, I know you can’t be serious with this.”

“Of course I’m serious.” Steve shrugged, worked hard at tempering his smile. “I’m sure we’ll all remember everything in the morning.”

“Sure. After a few beers, nothing could possibly get lost along with a few brain cells from the alcohol. It seems like some of us have already lost too many.”

Chin and Kono looked up as he and Danny entered HQ, then exchanged quick, wry glances, before returning their focus to the smart table. The only thing better than winding Danny up was winding Danny up in front of an audience. It really wasn’t Steve’s fault that the guy was so entertaining, or that he made it so easy. 

“I know you know I’m a genius,” Steve said, letting loose a lopsided grin. 

“A genius at borrowing trouble,” Danny said easily as he sidled up next to Kono. “Witness if you will, cops doing their jobs, and without having to be asked repeatedly.”

“Dan-ny.”

“Don’t Danny me.”

“Uh-oh, Chin,” Kono said, nudging Danny with an elbow and a devilish grin. “Looks like Mom and Dad are fighting again. What’s he nagging about now, Steve?”

Steve had to laugh at how perfectly Kono played right into it. His chuckle got stuck in his throat, though, when he saw Danny wasn’t just unamused, but something more. The expression on his partner’s face was actually what gave him pause, not quite blank but not quite right, either. It was disturbing to see, considering how moments ago Danny was his usual animated self. 

“Funny,” Danny said, flat. “Just keep on with what you’re doing, huh, maybe impress upon our fearless leader the logic behind clearing the desks of paperwork right after a case wraps instead of waiting until the details are blurred in your memory.”

Speech given, Danny then pivoted and headed for his office without another word. There might have been some sort of hand gesture as he walked, but it was too indistinct to know if it was a flip off or a wave. He sat stiffly at his desk, didn’t spare the rest of them another glance. 

Steve narrowed his eyes, good humor diminished. It wasn’t like Danny to just give up halfway through one of their things. It wasn’t like Danny to walk away. Steve chewed on his lower lip for a moment, then decided he was probably reading more into Danny’s sudden departure than was there. He glanced at Chin and Kono, who were back to cataloguing evidence. If they didn’t notice anything off, there was probably nothing to notice. 

“You guys almost done here?” Steve asked, thumping the edge of the table with a knuckle and trying to get his head back onto winding down the day.

“Another twenty minutes,” Chin said, “Maybe half an hour.”

“That’s not so bad. I was thinking Hilton when we’re done?”

“Ah, I’ll have to take a raincheck.” Chin glanced at Steve with a small smile. “First time we’ve closed a case when Malia’s also got the night off in a long time. Nothing personal, but I don’t want to lose that kind of premium time with her to go out with you guys.”

“Understood.” Steve clapped Chin on the shoulder and turned to Kono. “What about you?”

“I’ve already made plans, sorry,” Kono said, then looked pointedly toward Danny’s office. “You’re stuck with Grumpy.”

“Thanks for nothing,” Steve said with a laugh. 

With his attempt to get out of paperwork now off of the table, Steve decided he might as well suck it up. He would never tell Danny, but he did understand and appreciate getting the nuts and bolts paperwork done in a timely fashion even if he still hated it. There really was no telling if the morning would bring another case; with their track record, it was more than likely. Better to put it all to bed when the bedding was good. He chewed on his lip a bit and stared at Danny’s office as he went to his own. 

Danny’s sudden shift in mood was giving Steve a sense of déjà vu. He worried his partner over in his mind as he began working on documenting the case start to finish, multitasking like the professional he was. So what if he spent more time sneaking looks toward Danny’s office than his computer screen? It wasn’t like he had the lure of going out at this point. He had all night to work on the report. Never one to sustain a happy mood for very long anyway, lately Danny had started developing more frequent and sudden bouts of irritation. Steve wasn’t exactly sure what was raising the red flags for him, other than Danny’s MO was not one of a hair trigger. Save for the Rick Peterson nightmare, his partner didn’t go off half-cocked and even during those extreme circumstances, Danny kept it tightly contained. It wasn’t like Danny was being all that different to his usual dour self. Except sometimes he _was_. 

He would have sworn they had been doing a thing out there with the banter, until they just weren’t anymore. Steve narrowed his eyes, peered toward Danny again. If there was one thing he’d learned about his complex partner, it was there was often a deeper, valid reason for his sometimes over-the-top reactions. Danny wasn’t frivolous about the things that genuinely upset him. Steve wanted to understand the rapid switch that had just happened, because Danny being upset was high up on his own list of things that he found upsetting. It might be a hair unhealthy that his own happiness hinged so closely on the state of his partner, but he couldn’t honestly say it wasn’t true. For Steve, so much of his life was all or nothing.

And he’d already admitted that his partnership with Danny definitely fell on the all side.

“Callin’ it, Steve,” Kono shouted. 

He’d become so lost in thought, he actually jerked a little when Kono rapped against the glass of his office wall as she made for the exit. Steve waved absently at her and Chin as well, who was strolling toward Kono from the general vicinity of Danny’s office. 

“Have a good night,” Steve called.

Once the cousins were gone and he examined just how ineffectually he’d been multitasking (something he should feel worse about than he did), Steve got his head onto filing his reports. He knew his and Danny’s would sync with no problem, the same way Chin and Kono’s always did. He didn’t need the reminder of how great his team was, but he took it anyway. 

He also took the fact that while Danny might piss and moan from time to time about procedure, these days there was a lot less of it. Danny had his back, in the field and on paper. He always appreciated having good people around him, but some had more lasting impact than others. He was at a point now he didn’t know how well he’d move along without Five-0. He wasn’t sure that was a good thing, instantly brought him back to that final mission of his before he accepted this position, how it all went sideways, how someone he cared for had died.

Steve scrunched his eyes shut. The last thing he needed was to think about the mess which lay underneath his entire existence, didn’t want to draw comparisons between people and situations that were so unalike and somehow so much the same as well. In quiet times, interludes of inactivity, these thoughts were harder to tamp down. There was a reason SEALs thrived under pressure, a skill so basic it was part of their makeup before training began. A SEAL was born, he was sure, and then shaped when he was at his peak. Action was good, flashes of thought vital for survival. A slow burn of contemplation got him into trouble. There were too many memories and feelings, both of which could break for the surface if he wasn’t careful. 

“You gonna buy me that beer or what, McGarrett?”

Danny had perfect timing. Steve smiled and opened his eyes to Danny leaning against the doorframe with crossed arms and an expression on his face that was somewhere between weariness and fondness.

“I did paperwork like you insisted,” Steve said, saving his half-finished work and closing it in case Danny rounded the desk and caught him out. “You’re buying.”

“I’m shocked by this unexpected turn of events,” Danny said, the eye roll implicit in his tone. 

Steve laughed, and in that moment all was okay in the world. He guided Danny out of the offices, one hand casually on his partner’s shoulder, everything else that had been on his mind put on the proverbial back burner in favor of a few good drinks with a good friend.


	2. Chapter 2

The problem with his self-appointed mission became almost immediately apparent to him. In watching Danny closely for evidence of what was behind his mood changes, Steve also took more notice of Danny in other, more physical ways. Those other ways translated directly as things he was proficient at burying, and were also things he hadn’t consciously considered regarding his partner. He’d spent a fair amount of time thinking how lucky he was to have such good people around him, but for all of his mental iterations about how Danny was the very best of friends, the inspection of his partner made him own up to the fact that label wasn’t entirely accurate. There was nothing sudden about how he was feeling now and the detour from his usual focus on Wo Fat was a welcome one.

“So then she asked me to explain what dipping the pen in the company ink meant, because she was pretty sure but wanted to be absolutely certain,” Danny said, the level of outrage in his voice high, high, very high. He stabbed at his lunch like it was a mortal enemy. “Can you believe that? These are our educators, the people we are trusting to mold the minds of future generations, and they’re talking sex gossip right there in the hallways like the Academy of the Sacred Hearts is a set for some nighttime soap opera.”

“I assume you spoke to the dean,” Steve said, then popped a garlic shrimp in his mouth. 

“You bet your ass I did.”

As far as Steve was concerned, Danny riled was one of life’s most amazing sights. He lost some of what Danny was saying, since his eyes flicked to Danny’s lips which were glossy with the sauce from his own shrimp plate. Yeah, getting caught up in the mix of traits Danny possessed that shouldn’t work but did anyway – curve of his back, the smallness of his ears, the sleepiness of his eyes – wasn’t difficult to do. It was also a side effect he really should have anticipated and adjusted for prior to concentrating on his partner’s every move. He’d noticed all of these things within seconds of meeting Danny in that dusty garage, of course, and had promptly locked his reactions down. He’d spent the better part of two years telling himself he was fond of Danny and that his fondness had boundaries, and he had been so good at it he’d bought it lock, stock and barrel. 

Except now Steve had to face the fact he hadn’t been particularly successful, considering he’d gone from sure he was fond but not in love to completely, irreversibly taken with Danny in a matter of days. Steve wanted the whole package, from Danny’s perfect ass to his sometimes imperfect mood. While it seemed like a sudden shift on proverbial paper, he had to admit to himself that it had been a long time coming. 

He wasn’t the kind of guy who believed in fate, yet Steve couldn’t deny that with the state he’d been in when he’d returned to Hawai’i, someone like Danny was precisely what he’d needed. What he still did need, in any form he could get. If he could turn back time, though, he didn’t think he’d push Danny into asking Gabby out quite so readily, which had in effect been him removing his chances through his own actions. Not that it would matter in the long run, because Danny had asked her and had so far only exhibited interest in women. Steve had no grounds for hope. Having feelings for someone who likely wouldn’t reciprocate wasn’t the end of the world. He’d been there before, and had always had his thing with Cath to take the edge off from time to time. He felt troubled by the thought, wasn’t sure why there was less appeal in that prospect now. He’d never let himself get so invested in something he couldn’t have, the way he was invested in Danny.

“Are you even listening to me?” Danny asked, snapping his fingers in front of Steve’s face.

“Stop it.” Steve reared back and swatted at Danny’s hand, then ducked his head and hoped the hangdog expression would work. “Sorry, my mind drifted.”

“Nice. So, my very real problems bore you?”

“Nope, not at all,” Steve said, grabbing for the hand he’d just slapped away. He grinned as he wrapped his hand around Danny’s wrist and held on gently. “Don’t be mad.”

“What the hell are you doing?” Danny pulled free and gave Steve a funny look. “Let go of me.”

“Hey, hey, fellas,” Kamekona broke in, suddenly standing right at their table. He waggled his eyebrows, his malleable face evoking his good humor. “I don’t condone this hands-on spousal squabbling at my fine eating establishments. Keep that behind closed doors or I’ll have to call the authorities.” 

Danny froze. His whole countenance changed, and alarm bells started going off in Steve’s head. He frowned, thought about the strange look Danny had just given him.

“You’re hilarious,” Danny said. He dropped his fork and slid out from the table. “I just remembered I gotta do a quick thing before heading back to HQ. Keys, please.”

Dumbly, Steve handed over the keys. Without another word, Danny spun and stalked away. The déjà vu was overwhelming and, just like that, it all hit Steve like a ton of obvious bricks. The pattern held, and all the pieces slotted neatly into place. An innocent remark from a barista, a mocking jibe from a criminal, a joke from Kono – the common thread in each case was some insinuation that he and Danny were together. Married. Steve’s lunch turned into a lump in his stomach, cold and heavy. These kinds of implications had happened since the day he and Danny had met. Danny had joined in the jokes before, and while his partner had never seemed thrilled with the offhand commentary and extrapolation about their relationship, he wasn’t … Steve’s appetite left him as fast as Danny stormed away and all he could feel was confusion and hurt. 

It didn’t take long for anger to wipe out all other emotions. Steve got to his feet and took off after Danny before he could drive off without him. He was _sick_ at the thought that not only was Danny unattainable, he was … he was just like so many others. 

“What did I say?” Kamekona called after him. 

Steve caught up with Danny easily, stopped his partner’s forward movement with a firm grasp on his right bicep. A few minutes ago, all he would have noticed was how solid Danny’s muscles felt, but now he was certain there was a telltale tension brought on by his touch. Danny turned, his eyes hard as they flicked to where Steve gripped him, then back to his face. Steve took the cue and let go, but he itched to lash out. Unbidden, it was Danny’s voice warning him that he couldn’t beat a suspect just because he felt like it. God, Danny might not have been the person Steve thought he was all along. He didn’t want to believe it. He didn’t even want to think it. 

“We came together, you’re not going to drive off and leave me here,” Steve said, keeping his voice far calmer than he felt. 

“Right.” Danny tipped his head. “Sorry.”

There were few situations when Steve was at a loss on how to proceed. He was trained to analyze his environment, no matter what it was, quickly and with certainty; lives frequently depended on it. This wasn’t quite so dramatic, only it felt like it was actually much worse. Steve climbed into the passenger seat, uncomfortable in what was not his usual seat. Everything looked slightly different to what he was used to, the viewpoint skewed. He slid his attention to Danny as he fastened his seat belt, frowned at the way the lines at Danny’s eyes seemed less like they were from laughter and more like they were tense, pained. He couldn’t be sure he knew Danny all of a sudden, and he didn’t know what to do with that. 

The silence in the car felt oppressive to him, but he didn’t know how to broach this subject, or if he even should. He could be wrong. He had never wanted to be wrong so much. He could have leapt to conclusions and needed more time to figure it all out. As Danny drove the car to HQ without making his purported errand, Steve’s hopes fell.

“I thought you had something to do first,” Steve said. 

Danny pulled into a parking spot and killed the engine. He gave Steve a variation of the strange look he’d used at Kamekona’s, mostly blank but with an underlying vague something. 

“Didn’t think you’d want to be dragged along. I’ll do it later,” Danny said and started to get out of the car.

Steve reached and grabbed Danny by the wrist. Half out of the car, Danny twisted and tried to wrench free but Steve only tightened his hold. The last thing he wanted was to confirm his suspicions, but he had to. 

“Wait.” Steve’s throat was dry as a bone. “Wait a second.”

“What is with all of the manhandling?”

“Does it bother you?” Steve snapped. He released Danny’s wrist as soon as the words were out, like the skin contact with his partner was directly responsible for his brain-to-mouth misfire. But now he’d said it, he wanted to know. 

“What?”

“Me touching you. Does it bother you?” 

Red splotches crept up Danny’s neck, inched toward his face. The physical evidence didn’t lie. Oh shit. Steve changed his mind. He so did not want to know. He wanted to rewind the clock and not have a clue that Danny was homophobic. He knew even in this day and age, it was as prevalent a mindset in some parts of law enforcement as it remained so in some military settings, he’d just never thought _Danny_ could be someone like that.

“We’re not having this conversation right now. Please, can we not?” Danny said, his voice gruffer than usual, like he was trying to contain his feelings. 

He wasn’t the only one. Steve couldn’t say for sure that if they were out in the great wide open he wouldn’t lay Danny out with one good punch, and that scared him. His gut was hardly ever wrong, but the issue was which gut impulse was right – the one that had fallen in love with Danny, or the one that told him Danny was revolted by that very idea? He closed his eyes briefly and by the time he opened them back up, Danny was halfway to the entrance of the _Hale_. Once again, he found himself chasing after his partner, who could really move when he wanted to. This time, Steve didn’t catch him until they were crossing the HQ main entrance threshold and this time, he didn’t lay a hand on Danny. He just crowded after him into his office.

“Really, Steve, do you really think _here_ is the best place to air this out?” Danny asked, weary, and he swept his arm out toward the main room, where Kono was fiddling with the tech table. 

“No, I don’t think here is the best place. I don’t think there is a best place at all,” Steve said. He ran a hand down his face, suddenly tired himself. It was almost like he’d been sucked into a vortex and this was some cheesy sci-fi alternate reality, one in which his dearest friend was actually a goatee-sporting evil bastard. “I just never pegged you for this.”

“Sorry to disappoint you.” The color in Danny’s neck returned, darker this time, and it spread over his face like wildfire. Somehow, he also looked like he was going to hurl any moment. “I really am.”

Steve clenched his fists and took a step closer to Danny, who blanched. It was so unlike his partner, who’d always been one of a select few to never yield ground to him, that Steve paused. His heart was pounding so fast it almost hurt in his chest. No, that wasn’t his physical heart aching, just his emotional one. Somehow, that was worse. He could not wrap his brain around the idea that he’d had it so wrong all of this time, and how it had spiraled out of control so quickly. Danny as anything more than a friend was a fantasy he could accept, but knowing now that he may never have truly known his partner left him reeling. If there was this one big thing about Danny he didn’t know, there could be so many more. Rationally, somewhere deep inside, he knew he wouldn’t be handling this so terribly if he hadn’t fallen in love with the guy.

“I hate to interrupt whatever this is, but HPD just called,” Kono said.

Steve glanced toward Kono, who stood at the door with an awkward expression on her face.

“We’ve got a robbery in progress at _First Hawaiian_. We’re closest to the scene.”

“Gear up,” Steve said, automatically resuming his role as team leader.

“Already geared, waiting on you two.”

As Danny skirted by him, Steve held up a hand. This discussion was done for the time being, duty first, but it was by no means dropped entirely. Danny didn’t look him in the face, instead focused his blank, peculiar gaze at Steve’s shoulder. 

“When this is over, we’re gonna have to figure out if we can work through this,” Steve said. “Or if we can’t.”

Danny’s flinch was almost imperceptible, but it was there nonetheless. So help him, Steve was so pissed off right now and yet he somehow wanted to reach for Danny, soothe that reaction. He was so screwed in the head.

H50H50H50

The simple fact was that in the short term, Steve couldn’t work with Danny.

He would make it through this immediate situation, but there was no way he could have Danny at his side in the same capacity as he’d grown reliant on here. The decision was one that left him cold, but that horrible conversation they’d had coupled with his partner’s continued strange faces and posture made it next to impossible for him to concentrate like he needed to. It was still too fresh in his mind and he was out of practice cordoning off the mental distractions so he could function at his best. His relaxation into civilian life, too, felt like it was somehow Danny’s doing. Of all of Five-0, Danny had always been the one who’d kept Steve tethered to the island. He’d finally admitted that, and now…

The schematics blurred in front of him as his attention was partially drawn to the sight of Danny chewing on his lip, his emotions about his partner’s expression split between confusion and anger. Danny looked for all the world like he was the injured party and that was wrong. Danny shouldn’t be the one hurt here and that he was playing it off that way was not all right. Steve clenched his jaw, and his fists. He took several deep breaths, wrangled himself under control and realized, no, Danny wasn’t being normal and the levels of emotion he was feeling because of it were not sustainable. While it was workable on the exterior and out of the danger zone, once they went in, he couldn’t risk it. He was making the right call. Until he and Danny could hash this out, he couldn’t be anywhere near the guy.

“The good news is the building’s layout makes for several easy entrance points,” Steve said, thankful his inner issues didn’t bleed into his tone. He pointed at the schematics Chin had pulled up on the tablet. “Here, here and here. We and SWAT teams can breach from all three.”

Steve paused, waited for the inevitable protest stemming from Danny, the railing about negotiating and hostage safety and procedure. It never came, and the first intentional look he’d spared to his partner showed that same pensive, almost wounded expression aimed at the ground. He frowned and knew he was losing the battle to get his head in the right game not because of Danny, but his own reactions. He needed to stop thinking of Danny’s homophobic attitude as a personal attack; Danny had no idea Steve wasn’t one-hundred percent straight. Hell, until extremely recent history, he hadn’t been willing to admit it to himself. Maybe, just maybe he had overreacted. He scowled, hated himself for waffling based on Danny’s hurt puppy face. Personal or not, he was clearly and completely thrown by not knowing Danny as well as he’d always presumed.

“We’ll send SWAT from above. Chin, you’re with me from these sewer tunnels. Danny, you head around back.” Steve ignored the raised eyebrow he caught Chin giving him out of the corner of his eye and he ignored another missing tirade from Danny at being relegated to the rear position. “Kono, you should be able to get a good angle inside the bank lobby from the parking garage across the street.”

“Scoped it out, Steve, I got it covered,” Kono said, bobbing her head to what she’d estimated to be the best vantage point. She also had the rifle out, and took off with a, “Be careful, guys.”

Honestly, negotiation was always preferable, but the luxury of having HPD putting Five-0 first on scene was the freedom that guaranteed. If SWAT were there first, he knew he’d have to step on more toes to get things done. Steve knew they could play the negotiation game for hours on end, and SWAT was welcome to do that. As for him, he would always prefer a more proactive approach. Negotiating with people who would only get more agitated and therefore dangerous as time passed had never struck him as the only or best way to go. He slid a look at Danny. In this case, they’d already established there were only three inside, with ten bank workers and five customers. It shouldn’t be difficult to overpower the perps without risking any of the civilians. 

At the bare minimum, once they got inside they could collect much better intel. The entire operation should take less than an hour. Breach the interior, take out the perps and save the civilians. It should be a simple thing, a milk run. The irony struck him a little too late, them breaking into a bank just like he and Danny had joked about weeks ago. Steve would have to delete those emails, felt like a fool for having kept them now. It wasn’t like him to hold onto things for sentimental value, least of all emails that had always brought a smile to his face. None of this preoccupation with Danny was like him and he should have known not to indulge in fantasy. Unfortunately, he hadn’t even realized that was what he was doing. He turned to tell Danny to take his position, realized the other man had already left and sidled up to the SWAT team to pick out his backup. Damn it, he should feel neither guilty nor jealous about that. 

“You all right?” Chin asked. “Things seem tense.”

“It’s fine, it’s nothing,” Steve said too quickly and then tried to pull his face into some sort of puzzled mask, like he wasn’t sure why Chin would say such things. “Let’s do this.”

He turned his back on Chin’s attention, didn’t want anyone else to be distracted. He needed to get a grip on it himself. He was keenly aware how off-kilter he was, if Chin had noticed it. It felt like his right hand had fallen asleep – there, but not feeling quite attached to his body. The sensation wasn’t enjoyable, but it was within his own power to shake that limb awake. Or cut it off. Steve glanced around, his gaze drawn to Danny as it so often was. His partner was fiddling with the straps of his vest, squinting against the sun. Steve averted his eyes when Danny shifted his stance, focused instead on the manhole cover which would lead him and Chin into the tunnels below the bank.

He didn’t make it halfway to the cover before a shot rang out, a loud crack of sound he recognized for what it was, yet became disconcerted by it momentarily. In the span of one heartbeat, maybe two – less than half a second, there was chaos. Shouts from every direction as all officers scrambled for cover, reacted accordingly to an undisclosed threat. Steve stood his ground, spun and searched for the shooter, which was almost impossible to do without ano…a powerful punch to his chest rocked him back a step. Almost simultaneously, all extraneous noise was replaced by static. He’d taken bullets before, and he knew he’d been struck in his body armor. 

He didn’t have time to get his proverbial feet under him when the second, harder punch drove him to the ground. Steve smelled sweat, cologne, something acrid. Through the buzz in his ears, there filtered through the utterance of his own name, muffled and slow but familiar, then his head slammed into an unyielding surface. 

Steve opened his eyes, saw brightness above. For a few moments, he was at a total loss as to what he was doing flat on his back. It cleared up when he heard voices, followed by two concerned but relieved faces. He discovered how dry his throat was when he tried to talk, ended up coughing weakly. His head had been aching at a dull throb, which ratcheted up with the cough, and so did pain spread across his chest. Kono lifted a straw to him, held it for him to take a few sips.

“Thanks,” Steve said after he’d drawn enough water to wet his tongue.

He scrunched his eyebrows together, head muddy. He squinted at his surroundings, hospital, but not a private room. A thin blue curtain wrapped around the gurney on which he lay. 

“Where?”

“Tripler,” Kono said as she set the cup of water on the small cart at the head of the bed. She smiled at him, but it looked hollow. Her hair was mussed, she still wore her vest. “You have a mild concussion. You’ve been in and out.”

Steve scowled, which only made his head ache worse. He attempted to relax. He didn’t recall any ins or outs and he hated that sensation of missing time that came with being knocked out. He also hated that it meant he’d been injured enough to elicit that worried look on Kono’s face.

“What happened, exactly?”

“You don’t remember?” Chin said, exchanging a glance with Kono. 

It wasn’t like he’d had any time to try. He had a vague sense of it involving SWAT and a large building. Steve simply didn’t know the specifics of what had caused his roaring headache; in their job, it could have been any number of things. Obviously, it had been bad enough to warrant him a gurney space in the emergency department, but with no doctor around, he was pretty sure he wasn’t looking at an admit.

“No, I …” 

“I’m sorry to interrupt,” a rumpled-looking woman in a white coat said, interrupting him. She beckoned at Chin. “Detective Kelly, a moment, please?”

Steve was groggy, but he didn’t miss another look between Chin and Kono. Belatedly as Chin began to follow the doctor, Steve noticed dark stains smearing Kono’s right sleeve, similar ones on the collar of Chin’s shirt. Neither boded well. He tried to lift his head, look for the source of bleeding on his own person. Head wounds bled, maybe the blow he’d taken had broken skin. He quickly decided his range of motion wasn’t too vast yet when the room spun, and lay back down. 

Instead, he closed his eyes, made the attempt to remember more. He could count numerous occasions which had landed him in a hospital in vivid detail, but all he could see in his mental playback of recent history was Danny. At first it was good, a sense of calm washing over him, and something more poignant and new, a deeper connection. He knew without a doubt what his feelings were. But then when he touched his partner, Danny’s face changed into an unpleasant mask and Steve watched him pull free. The feeling that came with this change made his heart clench, which apparently was enough to trip something on a monitor he didn’t even realize he was hooked up to and prompted Kono to grab his hand. 

Steve wanted to tell her that he was fine. Physically, it was true. He’d had worse. He’d had worse mentally, too, but the memory of what seemed like rejection from Danny left him feeling so bruised. He didn’t quite understand. It was like a puzzle and he only had the outside pieces in place; the middle was a gaping hole. He wasn’t sure what the picture was actually supposed to be.

“Do you remember?” Kono whispered, and it almost sounded to him like she was hopeful for a less obvious reason than evidence of his recovery. 

“No.” Steve shook his head, cringed at the pain the motion caused. “Not really. Care to share?”

“Maybe we should wait for Chin to come back.”

That Danny wasn’t anywhere to be found only added fuel to his memory. Something wasn’t right. Steve had an intangible feeling of _wrong_ when it came to Danny, but he was pretty sure the guy wouldn’t be such a dick as to not check and see if he was okay. He eyed the bloodstains on Kono’s shirt again, trepidation rising.

“Tell me,” Steve said, putting as much of his usual authority into his voice as he could. “What’s going on, Kono?”

Kono chewed on her bottom lip, appearing more uncertain than Steve recalled her being in at least six months. She glanced toward the edge of the curtain, then back to him. Sighing, she sat near his feet and looked anywhere but at him. The stains on her shirt streaked both sleeves, not just the right one.

“Kono.” That bad feeling of his not going away. “Where’s Danny?”

That got her to look at him, which would have been more of a victory had she not seemed wrecked. 

“He’s here,” Kono said. “Steve, we were at a bank hold-up in progress. We were going to breach the bank, but there was a sniper no one expected. You were out in the open, you took a hit. Danny, he…” 

All of the air whooshed out of his lungs. No. 

“He didn’t,” Steve whispered. “Tell me he didn’t.”

Kono slid off the bed and moved to stand next to his shoulder. Her touch was feather-light on his arm. 

“He did,” she said. 

“How bad is it?” 

“It looked…” Kono cleared her throat, leaned against the bed for support. She vaguely gestured at her neck. “Awful. Steve, it was a neck shot.”

“Shit,” Steve said. He raised his hands to cover his face, noticed the rust colored stains under his short nails, so similar to the marks Kono and Chin both wore. He stared at his fingers. “Kono, what _happened_ out there?”

“Danny saved you, brah, and then you saved him,” Chin said as he re-entered through the curtain. “Before you demand to know more, I think the details can wait. Just know he lost a lot of blood and was hypovolemic when he got here, but they’re hopeful. The doc told me they’ve got him stabilized enough for surgery to repair the blood vessels that were hit. They’re heading in now.”

Steve swallowed a few times, sick at the thought of anyone - _Danny_ \- taking a bullet for him. His odd conflicted feelings and memories, he didn’t know what they meant and he didn’t care. That puzzle he had framed in his head blew into a thousand pieces. It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered about that if Danny wasn’t okay.

H50H50H50

The cold water against his face didn’t fix anything, but it went a long way to help rinse off the film of sweat. Steve splashed more, then cupped his hands and took a quick drink. He couldn’t see himself returning to sleep after the last dream and prepared himself for yet another long night. Even just closing his eyes for a minute, he was bombarded with remnants of what had him stumbling for the bathroom like a zombie.

_“Danny,” he said. “You’re not doing this. Don’t you fucking do this.”_

_Steve’s hands were at Danny’s throat and he was trying like hell to stem the flow of blood. There was so much. He couldn’t see anyone surviving this kind of injury, but it was Danny. Danny could not die. His partner stared at him with eyes wide, face gray and lips colorless, looking completely panicked. Steve understood exactly what that look meant and he would not have it. Around them, cacophony of sirens, shouts and gunfire._

He shuddered. Of all the horrors he’d seen and experienced through the years, it was ironic that he was now haunted partially by something of which he had no memory, only hints that leaked through in his dreams. It was nothing more than conjecture from an exhausted mind. Steve glanced at his hands, almost expected the bloodstains to still be there. Back in the hospital, right after it had happened, he’d only fully realized what had been embedded under his fingernails after Chin had mentioned how he’d saved Danny’s life. He was glad for the gap in his memory; it was bad enough to imagine what it felt like to have Danny’s life slipping through his fingers. 

_Steve knew the expression on Danny’s face. He’d seen it too many times – shit, once in a lifetime was too often. It wasn’t the desperation that got to him. It wasn’t the fear. It was what lurked just behind those two emotions, hiding in the shadows like the monster it was. There was vague acceptance in his partner’s eyes that signified there was no more fight left. Never a good thing to witness, it felt a thousand times more terrible with Danny. Danny was quick to vocalize giving up, but at the heart of him, he was a fighter; he only needed to be reminded of that from time to time._

_His own desperation and fear amped higher as Danny’s eyes lost focus and his eyelids began to slide closed. Keeping his right hand tight against the wound on Danny’s neck, Steve cupped his left one on his partner’s face. He rubbed his thumb across Danny’s cheekbone, careful not to jar him and risk even more blood loss, but wanting to keep him from slipping away._

_“Come on,” Steve said. “Stay with me. Stay.”_

_No amount of begging on his part would keep Danny alive, he knew this. He wasn’t going to be able to save his partner. There was too much blood already lost. But Danny opened his eyes and looked at him, as if responding to his plea. For a second only that blankness was in Danny’s gaze, and it gutted Steve. He glanced over his shoulder for help, wondered what was taking the EMTs so long. He felt Danny shift beneath his touch and turned back. The terrifying look of death was gone. In its place, something so much worse._

_“Get your hands off me,” Danny said, his voice an angry snarl. His eyes were dark with disgust, hate. “Don’t touch me, you f –”_

Steve pulled the hand towel from its rack and pressed it against his face. It wasn’t real. He didn’t recall doing what Chin and Kono had said he’d done, saving Danny’s life by clamping the bloodflow with his fingers. Neither of the dream scenes had happened outside the confines of his own mind. Though he could only guess that a variation of the first had, he did remember what it was like to have Danny twist away from his touch. He couldn’t keep away the thoughts that maybe there was a grain of truth in both scenarios. His brain was only extrapolating from events he’d been told about and those he did remember, things he wanted to resolve. 

The problem was simple – while he remembered Danny’s issues and the conversation which had revealed them in painful detail, the trauma Danny had suffered left him with a month’s hole in his memory. Steve could take that as a clean slate, forget everything that had happened himself, but it didn’t sit right with him. He couldn’t be in a partnership with someone and have that kind of thing hanging over his head. He had no idea how to tackle the problem, though, and didn’t want to do it while Danny’s health was still fragile anyway. The added layer that Danny would likely be taken off guard only made it that much more complicated.

He caught his reflection in the mirror, not too surprised by what he saw. He looked like hammered shit, gaunt with dark circles under his eyes. Steve couldn’t honestly say when his last full night’s sleep had been. It felt to him like he’d been caught in a loop of terrible dreams forever, though it had only been a few weeks since Danny’d been shot. No one had said anything to him about his ragged appearance, but if he could see it himself, then surely they would have noticed. He was sure Danny would have called him on it, had he seen Danny at all since the hospital, where he’d only visited when he knew the other man would be sleeping. He flicked the light off and stood in the darkened bathroom for a few moments.

He headed downstairs, automatically making his way to the garage. Tinkering on the Marquis had become his go-to distraction during these sleepless early morning hours, though by this point it was mostly cosmetic. The car had never gleamed so brightly, having been waxed countless times. Steve picked up a fresh cloth and absently swiped at non-existent dust and smudges. His own reflection peered back at him, but as he stared absently at it, it quickly morphed into Danny’s face. Like in the dreams, first it was Danny, grey and nearly lifeless and then the expression switched rapidly to Danny curling his lip in derision.

Of all the enemies he’d ever fought, none were as tough as the demons his own mind created. 

Steve’s gut swirled at the imagined images and he abandoned the garage, the reflections. He moved through the dim house for the kitchen, mixed himself some baking soda and water. He gulped it down, as if the feeling he was experiencing was indigestion. He’d give his left eye for it to be so simple. While he waited for the remedy to do absolutely nothing for his ailment, he went onto the _lanai_ and then the grass beyond to stand at the edge of the beach. The ocean’s waves soothed him somewhat, but not completely. Nothing was going to do that. 

He knew why the dreams had increased in intensity and frequency – Danny was due back to desk duty tomorrow. With Danny not in his space for upwards of twelve hours a day like usual, it had been easy to avoid thinking about the elephant in the room only he could see. Steve had no idea how to bring the subject up, but he knew he had to. He couldn’t continue like this, not with the other heavy things pressing on him. He wished he could ignore it and continue to focus only on the Wo Fat issue. That this thing with Danny and his homophobic attitude took precedence over what had become such an integral part of his spare time spoke volumes. Wo Fat was personal, but Danny … despite his current dilemma, Danny was still everything. 

He had no lingering expectations of anything beyond a working partnership with Danny, but he knew he couldn’t do even that unless he knew if Danny could handle working with him. He needed to re-unbury the secrets Danny held, to make sure he had it right. The time for avoiding the situation was over, this had to be his last sleepless night. In his gut, he thought he had to be wrong about Danny. Maybe he was clinging to hope where there wasn’t any. Maybe he was fooling himself when it came to Danny, but Steve knew himself. He had spent so many years under the thumb of an only recently-repealed military policy that made accepting a big part of who he was an impossibility. In some strange way, the idea of confronting Danny and revealing himself once and for all was powerful motivation. And in the face of a much more personal condemnation, it was also a more powerful action to take.

The thought of losing Danny because Danny couldn’t or wouldn’t be okay with him being gay was in many ways a more difficult one to face than the threat of a discharge from the Navy ever had been.

Steve eased himself into the closest chair, slouched to rest the base of his skull on the back of it. He’d spent too much time turning this over in his head, letting it rule his every thought while being unable to face it head on. It, like so many things lately, wasn’t like him. He could excuse it as being part of his own recovery, but he was a SEAL. A mild concussion was nothing. He stared up at the stars, listened to the susurration of waves against the shore and began to focus on the dark spaces between the billion sparks of light in the sky. 

And woke up to the smell of the ocean on his skin and all around him, the bright light of morning coloring his eyelids red-orange. Steve shifted, moved slowly as his body demonstrated how bad an idea it was to sleep on a hard, wooden chair. Of course, he hadn’t intended on sleeping. He was surprised by it, in fact, as he usually found no rest after his nightmares. He straightened. His neck popped, his head ached and his shoulders were tense. As he stretched, eyes still closed and face lifted toward the sun, he became aware of something else.

He wasn’t alone. 

He opened his eyes and turned stiffly. His company sat on the other chair, an expression on his face that was hard to read. Steve couldn’t help it; his base reaction was one of attraction. He felt it low in his belly, a virtual flutter of nerves and lust, and he braced himself for this to be a dream and for Danny to either disappear … or lash out at him. 

“You look like shit, McGarrett,” Danny said. 

Steve’s eyes were drawn to the wound on Danny’s neck, just visible above the collar of his shirt. It was still angry and red, but it would probably fade to become nothing more than another line in the landscape of Danny. The doctors had done good work, he reconsidered, and it might actually enhance Danny’s appearance once it aged. He pulled his eyes away from Danny’s neck, squinting up at his partner’s face instead.

“Danny,” he said, “what are you doing here?”

“First day back to work.” Danny’s hands were in his pockets. He tilted his head to side slightly, a pose so subtle few would have pegged it as significant. “I thought maybe it would be a good idea to get back to routine.”

They hadn’t consistently carpooled to the office for months now. There had never been a really good reason they’d done so and the habit had dropped off naturally. With a pang, Steve realized that he kind of missed it. The point was there was nothing routine about Danny stopping by before work anymore, and definitely not at this hour. Steve rubbed the sleep out his eyes, stood, stretched and glanced at Danny.

“Need to shower.”

That expression of Danny’s remained inscrutable but weighted, though he made a good show of hiding it behind a bland sort of amusement at Steve’s comment. The amount of fondness he saw Danny aim in his direction had never used to confuse him. Steve pondered if he really wanted to open the can of worms that had kept him up so many nights, decided that it was too early. If he did it now, then there was a fair chance the day would be even more miserable than he already anticipated it would be. No. This wasn’t the time.

“I’ll make the coffee,” Danny called after him. “You look like you could use some.”

Steve waved a hand as he all but ran from the source of his issues. He was still unsettled by the dreams he’d had of Danny, and now of Danny in the flesh, in his home. He couldn’t get any of it out of his head. While he showered, he mulled over the possible reasons for Danny showing up on his doorstep. He couldn’t imagine the reason, but he was filled with a sense of foreboding coupled with inappropriate excitement. It was this exact kind of dichotomy that troubled him so much, but when he left the bathroom for his bedroom and the enticing aroma of coffee wafted up the stairs, the loudness of his TV blaring, Steve decided that if it was routine Danny wanted, it was routine he was going to get.

H50H50H50

Steve peeled the front of his shirt away from his chest and flapped it a few times. The sticky sensation wasn’t pleasant, and the ripe odor of sour milk and general putrefaction that hit his nose half a second later was even worse. He regretted trying to gain some comfort only to lose it elsewhere. He was going to have to take the risk his shirt wouldn’t adhere to his skin as the rot dried and move as little as possible from now until he could get to a shower. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Kono crinkle her nose and then move upwind of him.

“This could be you,” Steve said. 

“I think I speak for both of us when I say thanks for taking one for the team,” Chin said, humor audible in his tone despite the dead serious way he delivered the words. 

“Shoots,” Kono said, nearly choking back either laughter or disgust at the stench.

No one could ever say he was the kind of boss who would make his subordinates do the things he didn’t want to do himself, and he was wearing the proof of that. Danny would tell him he was simply oblivious to danger, be it something life-threatening or something more like he’d managed today – jumping right into an open dumpster to break a fall from an open second floor window. He glanced at Chin, whose hair wasn’t even ruffled from the foot chase. There may be some validity in that particular argument, but the thought of Danny emptied everything else out of his brain.

When it came down to it, he was grateful for how nuts the day had been. His plan to play routine with Danny had started proving more of a challenge than it should have been as early as the commute to HQ. The short ride had been filled with awkward lulls in a conversation that had felt forced to him. He knew Danny had something on his mind because he was acting weird, or at least a different kind of weird, and he sure as hell had his own set of issues. The tension had built to nearly tangible levels by the time they got to the office. It was ridiculous how relieved he’d been that a case had landed in their lap within minutes of starting the day, the distraction of Chin and Kono welcoming Danny back also helping on that front.

“You better put a tarp down or Danny’s going to kill you,” Chin said. 

“And buy air fresheners,” Kono said as she and Chin climbed into her car. “Lots and lots of air fresheners.”

Oh, shit, they were right and wasn’t this just perfect timing? Danny would get riled about his car, then Steve would spring the whole coming-out conversation on him. That would end real well, he thought. He popped the trunk and looked for something to cover the seat, considered whether or not today was really the day to discuss the issues keeping him up at night. By the time he got a towel down and slid behind the wheel, he realized he was making excuses again, like he had made excuses not to see Danny while he recuperated from his injuries. He had survived BUD/S. He was trained to withstand torture. Hell, he’d recently _been_ tortured. Somehow, though, being alone with Danny right now was almost a more difficult challenge to overcome. 

Steve had always thought his career was the most important thing in his life, and then … Danny. 

No, he knew he had to get it out in the open instead of continuing to think himself in circles. He couldn’t count on every day being like this one and Danny would be in the field again soon. He had to gauge Danny’s tolerance level with him once he found out Steve’s preference wasn’t necessarily on the side most people assumed it was. It was the possible consequences that were making him queasy. Or, he thought with a rueful grin, it was the garbage. 

Steve decided it really would be in his favor to make a pit stop for fresheners. When he got to HQ, the interior of the Camaro smelled like decay and piña colada and it wasn’t good. It was the amalgamation of smells that was making his stomach roil, nothing more. He saw Danny pacing the sidewalk as he pulled up. Kono’s car was nowhere to be found, and it wasn’t difficult to surmise he’d been sold out. He actually found the sight of Danny pacing a relief. His stomach eased a little. Seeing Danny wound tight like this was normal, routine. It was something he could work with, a familiarity he appreciated for his own comfort if nothing else. He grinned as he opened the car door.

“There is something wrong with your head,” Danny said before Steve had gotten all the way out. 

“I put a towel down and had the windows open the whole way,” Steve said, raising his hands and widening his grin in a way he knew irritated Danny, and wondering all the while what the hell he was doing. “Relax.”

Danny didn’t relax, of course, his shoulders stiffened and redness crept up his neck as he looked Steve up and down, gaze lingering on his chest and then flicking up to the sticky mess of his hair. Steve shifted on his feet, confused. If he didn’t know what he knew about Danny, he would think his partner was checking him out. It didn’t make sense. His plan and resolve faltered again. 

“Relax, he says.” Danny gestured to the car and spoke to the air as if the air were sentient and would agree with him. “He turns my car into a cesspool, and he wants me to relax.”

Steve shrugged. Not much he could say. He got the job done no matter what it took, usually. He had a flash of his nightmares, the look of disgust on Danny’s face as he pulled from his touch, and then a flash of Danny’s discomfort at his touch or the mere mention of them as a couple.

“I shut down the office,” Danny continued. “Since HPD booked our guy for us, I think the paperwork can wait on this one. Turn around and get your grubby ass back in the car. You started the day looking like shit, McGarrett, and I didn’t think it could get worse. I was wrong, because now you look like garbage.”

The corners of Danny’s lips curled up slightly, but he was also kind of scowling. Danny had become such a mish-mash of conflicting things in Steve’s head, he didn’t know why this particular look made his insides turn to mush. He complied with Danny’s order, mute in the face of a heart racing for varying reasons. His instincts were generally spot on, and right now they were screaming that the next few minutes of his life weren’t going to go the way he expected. Unlike most situations, he had no reliable experience to pull from to know how to proceed. The only way out was through. He climbed into the car to a full-on scowl from Danny, who glared at him and then retched a little and turned toward the open window and circled his left hand in the air to get Steve moving. 

The ride home was short, for once Danny not issuing complaints about Steve’s driving. He did, Steve noticed, slide him several sidelong looks the entire trip. Steve couldn’t say with absolute certainty given his own view was from his periphery only, but it seemed again like Danny still very much had something on his mind. The closer he got to home, the more nervous he got. It almost felt like he was heading into a duel, and worry over his own issue warred with curiosity over what Danny’s could possibly be. 

Steve parked the car in front of the house, took a glance at Danny and froze. The expression Danny bore was so filled with repugnance it mirrored Steve’s nightmare images exactly. It seemed he couldn’t stop himself from going back there. With the car no longer in motion, the stench coming off of him was more malodorous than ever and he wanted nothing more than to wash it all away. He scrambled out of the car and headed for the house.

“Steve, hey.”

“I promise, I will pay to have the car detailed,” Steve said over his shoulder. “Need to shower.”

“Déjà vu,” he heard Danny mutter.

Heading through the house out onto the lanai and his small outdoor shower, Steve stripped off his clothes and tossed them in a pile. His wardrobe from today was a total loss – he wasn’t going to run the risk of contaminating his washer. He didn’t want them stinking up the house, either. He stepped into the shower cubicle and turned the water on, giving himself a good rinse and then scrubbed down twice. He stood under the streaming water, leaned against the wall so it hit just at the nape of his neck, a necessary few minutes of relaxation. He had a stack of towels just outside the shower, so he grabbed one and dried off quickly, then wrapped it around his waist. He’d handle the dirty clothes later, headed inside to find something clean to put on. Two steps past the kitchen and into the living area, he knew without looking he wasn’t alone. 

“Ah,” Danny said, then cleared his throat.

Steve turned. He had no idea why he didn’t consider that Danny wouldn’t go anywhere, but there his partner was, sitting on the edge of the leather sofa and staring in his general direction with a totally discomfited look. Suddenly very aware that the only thing he had on was a loosely wrapped towel, he shifted on his feet. 

“You’re still here,” Steve said. 

“Yeah, there’s something I need to talk to you about and you’ve been avoiding me all day.” Danny’s eyes roamed everywhere and landed nowhere, but his attention was _not_ on Steve, almost like he was deliberately avoiding a direct stare. 

Steve knew that kind of evasive look all too well, and despite the tumult of the last month or so, from Danny it was still so unexpected. He self-consciously clutched at the towel, at odds with his own unexpected reactions. He was usually the most assured person on the planet, but he felt like a damned recruit right now. Danny’s gaze finally locked on something – Steve’s hand holding the towel. He watched Danny swallow a few times, then clench his jaw. Steve made a fist with his other hand. Like hell he was going to let anyone make him feel unsure about himself. 

“I suppose you’ll have a problem with this, but I need you to know I’m gay,” Steve blurted as fast as possible.

At the same precise moment, Danny said, “I know I usually blame you, but my getting shot wasn’t your fault, so stop beating yourself up.”

The silence that filled the room after they both spoke was more than awkward, it was cold and hard. Danny gawked at him for a few beats, face blank at first, then transformed into a wide-eyed stare. That, too, lasted only a few seconds, and then his eyebrows furrowed.

“What did you say?” Danny’s voice was low, dangerous. 

Disregarding what Danny had said at the same time as him, Steve squared his shoulders. It was out. He’d said it, he couldn’t take it back and he shouldn’t want to. He couldn’t bear the way Danny’s eyes were getting stormy, the anger in them, but he could only control his own behavior, no one else’s. 

“I said I’m gay.” Steve paused. “Well, bi. I like men and women. Men more, since I’m being honest.”

“That I picked up on just fine.” Danny stood, stalked over to him. His neck was red, particularly the long stripe the bullet had caused, and it was all further evidence of his ire. In contrast, his voice continued to be calm and measured. “I need you to clarify the thing you said right before that. Why the fuck would you think I would have a problem with this information?”

Danny’s indignation confused him. Hell, though, he had been wavering for the better part of a month. In for a penny, Steve thought. 

“You get pissed off every time someone mistakes us for a couple, Danny,” he snapped. “You don’t remember this now because of the shooting trauma, but you all but admitted to me that you have issues with gay people. I thought you ought to know who you’re working with.”

Danny’s breaths were loud, the way he got really worked up it almost seemed like he was laboring to draw air in sometimes. 

“Are you fucking _kidding_ me? Why would I have ever admitted to something like that when I…”

Trailing off, Danny ran a hand through his hair. He shook his head. 

“When you what?”

“Steve, let me make this clear. I don’t like the couple jokes because they’re usually marriage jokes, and while we have come a long way as a society, it is still the law in more places than not people like us can’t be legally married. It’s not a joking matter. It’s not cute. I got tired of those jokes because they are stupid and not all that funny anymore, if they ever were.” Danny’s face remained flushed and he looked so earnest. He gave a pause, presumably to breathe. “Oh, the jokes are mostly benign, I’ll admit that, but I hate the assumption in them that one guy has to play gender roles that are flat-out stupid even for the gender that’s supposedly assigned to them. Shall I go on? Because there are a bunch more stupid ways to dissect why those stupid jokes piss me off, and none of them have to do with me being a stupid bigot.”

Steve brushed by Danny and sank into the recliner, head spinning slightly. That was a whole lot words to sift through, and the only ones that stuck were going in a loop in his head. _People like us._ Nothing else really seemed important for now.

“People like us?” Steve said hoarsely, focusing intently on Danny’s face. 

Danny simply looked at him for a few long moments, the irritation fading slowly into something else. Something softer, and something exactly like the things that had kept Steve so befuddled by what he’d thought was Danny’s homophobia. It was patience, embarrassment and also a flawless representation of the fondness he himself felt for Danny so often. 

“Yes, people like us. Apparently we’re two of the biggest idiots on the planet with broken radar, babe, because not only am I bisexual also, but I have spent the better part of a year resisting the urge to jump you for fear of it costing our friendship. Hell, I was so on the edge I did something even dumber and slept with Rachel instead, for fuck’s sake.”

“Huh.” Steve’s mouth and throat were both dry. 

“The marriage thing couldn’t have been the only piece you used for evidence of my bigotry. Please tell me you’ve learned something from me about detective work.”

“No.” Steve shook his head, and it felt like his head was spinning. “No, it’s that you seem to flinch at the very idea of me touching you lately.”

Danny rubbed a hand at the back of his neck as he bobbed his head down. He looked at Steve with an uncomfortable smile. 

“Well, I’ll say it again – I have spent the better part of a year resisting the urge to jump you. Imagine what it was like with your hands on me.”

Stunned, Steve let himself slouch against the chair. The last few months played back in Steve’s head like a freaking movie montage, and he realized that every instance he thought he’d understood so perfectly had an alternate possible meaning. He did the only thing he could – he started laughing softly. Maybe a tad manically. 

“Oh,” he said when Danny encroached in his space, stood between his legs. He smiled. “You … oh.”

“Yes, oh,” Danny said, still looking pretty embarrassed. He sobered after a moment, studied Steve’s face. “You really do look awful. Have you been sleeping at all?”

“Not so much.” Like sleep mattered at the moment. Danny had just, he’d just laid it all out there and now he was acting like everything was completely normal. Like the world hadn’t just been turned upside down and strangely right side up by the same token. “Not very much at all, in fact.”

“Let me guess. It wasn’t guilt, it was you thinking I was a homophobic asshole and you … do you, ah … was it because you…?”

Comforted somehow by Danny’s sudden stuttering, Steve acted on instincts reinforced in the last few minutes that he’d had so many things so very wrong. He surged up and yanked Danny down, all of the weight and uncertainty and everything, everything, gone. He kissed Danny with no hesitation. A few seconds of the messiest, most uncoordinated kiss later, Danny straddled his lap and things got a whole lot better. Steve moaned into the kiss, parted his lips for Danny’s tongue. Danny tasted precisely the way Steve imagined and he never wanted to stop. All this time, they could have been doing this and more. God, he wanted more. He tilted his hips up, body taking to his brain’s impulses in earnest. 

Danny pulled back and Steve’s pulse increased. 

“Considering the weird and unfortunate events that led us to this point, maybe we should take it slow,” Danny said, chewing on his lip. He brought his hand up, brushed a thumb against Steve’s cheekbone, just under his eye, really. “How about we start with a nap?”

The image of waking up with Danny next to him was one that filled Steve with peace he hadn’t felt in so long, maybe ever. A nap sounded exactly right.


	3. Chapter 3

As he’d done a lot in recent weeks, Steve came awake with a soft gasp. He grasped the sheet in his left hand almost convulsively, unnerved as he always was at the dream. Beside him came a rustle, a quiet half-snore, and a hand landed on the center of his chest. A swell of warmth went through him, and along with it the wave of peace he had come to rely on so much. He was a lucky man. 

After he’d fucked up royally, failing to remember there were other people involved in his decisions and the ramifications of them now and took off after Wo Fat again, he hadn’t dared to hope Danny would stick with him. There had been hell to pay, no doubt, but Danny was still here. Through Wo Fat’s capture and escape, Doris’ reappearance and return to hiding, the custody struggle with Grace, Cath showing up … Danny stayed with him. 

He rolled to his right side, took in the sight beside him. More often than not, Danny slept at his place now. Steve had learned early on that Danny was a serious sleeper, one who took up as much room as his bedmate would allow. Right now he was flat on his belly with his arms and legs sprawled. The sheet bunched at his ass, leaving expanses of skin for Steve to enjoy. He had to smile at how there was a huge empty space on the right side of the bed, with Danny scooched over next to him. It all worked out, because Steve happened to love that about Danny, loved to wake up with the tickle of Danny’s hair in his nose or a jab to his shin with a sharp toenail. He knew these were probably strange things to think of as appealing, but they were real. They were quantifiable. He took Danny’s hand off of his chest and held onto it. A heartbeat later, he saw Danny’s eyes open a slit.

“Another one?” Danny asked quietly, voice craggy with sleep. “Bad?”

“Not so bad,” Steve said.

“Liar.” Danny squeezed his hand. “How did you ever make it as a SEAL when you suck so hard at lying?”

“Really, Danny, it wasn’t one of the worst ones.” It wasn’t one with Danny dying, or Danny rejecting him. It was survivable. “Go back to sleep.”

“Nah,” Danny said. He slid his leg up, nudged it between Steve’s. “If you’re awake, I’m awake.”

It made no sense by the strictest definition of the word, this rule that Danny had implemented immediately upon landing in his bed that first time for the best nap anyone anywhere had ever had. Apparently, the right someone had noticed Steve was looking rough around the edges when given the chance to do so and had taken it upon himself to remedy that. Steve had to admit it was working, though, if for no other reason than he refused to be the cause for Danny’s grouchiness from lack of sleep. He considered it part of his civic duty. He gave Danny a smile, kissed his forehead, then his nose. 

“Getting warmer.”

Steve laughed. He found he laughed a lot with Danny, in bed and out of it. He took the hint for what it was, pushed and pulled, maneuvered and untangled until Danny was on his back and he was on Danny, with nothing in between. 

“You can’t cure everything with sex, Danny,” he said, then pointedly rocked into his partner.

“It never hurts to try,” Danny gasped. “Oh, do that again.”

Steve couldn’t imagine a reason he’d stop. These middle-of-the-night sessions were something he had come to treasure. He kissed Danny, relished the combined funk of their breath in some weird way. What he tasted wasn’t sour, it was the sweetness of being with someone he cared deeply for so much he didn’t give a damn his mouth tasted like a swamp. Loved. He loved Danny. He put every ounce of it into the kiss. 

Danny was very responsive, wrapped his left leg loosely around the back of Steve’s thigh to give them both a better angle and access. Danny’s hand found its way to his ass, where it groped and guided. He smiled into the kiss, amused by the way Danny tried to sneak in control. Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn’t, and he enjoyed that there was that give and take between them.

He leaned most of his weight on his left arm, sneaking his right hand between them. Steve gently fondled Danny’s balls and was rewarded with a moan into his mouth and a tightened grip on his ass. He got his hand around both of their cocks, set a fast pace as he jacked them both, efficient and as smooth as he could without lube. He broke the kiss as he felt himself edging quickly toward orgasm, bowed his head into the crook of Danny’s neck instead. He ran his tongue along the still vivid scar to get to the spot directly below Danny’s ear which always pushed his partner into orgasm when he was this close already. 

Danny’s body stiffened in his release and he cried out, his hand scrabbling on Steve’s ass now. As happened often, Danny’s release prompted his own, something about knowing he was the one who had made Danny break into proverbial pieces. Steve continued to tug at their cocks, rough and without rhythm, as he came in spurts over Danny’s stomach and chest. Steve groaned, finally let go and flopped unceremoniously onto Danny to regain his breath. 

After a minute, Danny wriggled his arms free, ran his fingertips up Steve’s back until one hand rested at the nape of his neck, the other spread across the middle of his back. He stroked the back of his head a few times, his fingers entwining into Steve’s hair. He drifted toward sleep, contented. 

It was in moments like these, thankfully many, that Steve had to wonder how he had ever mistaken love for simple fondness.


End file.
